Air Malta and Ryanair will be discussing possible avenues of cooperation and will be collaborating on sales and commercial initiatives, including selling Air Malta tickets on the Ryanair portal and possibly introducing connection flights, tourism minister Konrad Mizzi said this morning.

Mizzi, who was addressing a press conference with David O'Brien, chief commercial officer of Ryanair, said the airline would continue to invest in Malta and will be adding a fifth based aircraft to help cover the 12 new routes the company will be servicing from Malta as of 2018.

"There is very little overlap in the two companies' routes and we believe both airlines could benefit from a closer relationship," he said. "This is very good news for Malta."

O'Brien said there was also very little overlap in the two airlines' passenger demographics and destination cross-section.

Air Malta and Ryan Air unveiled plans for a collaboration earlier this morning

"I think Air Malta has taken the right decision to open new markets that are uniquely open to them, like Tunisia," he said.

"We think it can only benefit Air Malta to have access to a portal that is visited 45 million times a month."

O'Brien also announced a €16.99 seat sale and said the company will be increasing carry-on luggage limit from 15kg to 20kg while reducing the cost of additional liggage from €35 to €25.

He said the airline had once again been confirmed as Europe's - and Malta's - largest airline, and will be flying 2.5 million passengers to Malta next year.

Ryanair's average fare was around one-third lower than that of competitors and that this was possible because the airline had managed to continue cutting costs at a time when many other airlines were seeing costs rise.

"By 17 July, Ryanair had carried one billion passengers, with an increase of 70 million passengers expected over the next seven years," he said.

Paul Cocks joined MaltaToday after having spent years working in newspapers with The Times...